Etymograph

English

brand

Brand comes from Middle English brand ‘fire, flame’, and goes back to Proto-Germanic *brinnaną ‘to burn’.

  1. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*brinnaną1‘to burn’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*brandaz1‘flame’reconstructed
  3. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*brand1‘fire’reconstructed
  4. Old Englishc. 450–1150brand1‘fire’
  5. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500brand1‘fire’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1513brand1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English brand
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1513, Gavin Douglas: “The fearful brands and bleezes of het fire.”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*brinnanąWiktionary, English brand‘to burn’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*brandazWiktionary, English brand‘flame’reconstructed
  3. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*brandWiktionary, English brand‘fire’reconstructed
  4. Old Englishc. 450–1150brandWiktionary, English brand‘fire’
  5. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500brandWiktionary, English brand‘fire’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1513brandWiktionary, English brand. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1513, Gavin Douglas: “The fearful brands and bleezes of het fire.”

The story

From Middle English brand, from Old English brand (‘fire; flame; burning; torch; sword’), from Proto-West Germanic *brand, from Proto-Germanic *brandaz (‘flame; flaming; fire-brand; torch; sword’), derived from Proto-Germanic *brinnaną (‘to burn’), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰrewh₁- (‘to boil; brew’).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Word family

English words that share an ancestor with brand, grouped by the ancestor they share, most familiar first.

through Proto-Indo-European *bʰrewh₁- ‘to boil’

  • purple ← purpul ← purpure ← purpura ← πορφύρα
  • bread ← bred ← *braud ← *braudą
  • bourbon ← *borvo
  • bourne ← burna ← *brunnō ← *brunnô ← *bʰréh₁wr̥
  • brew ← brewen ← brēowan ← *breuwan ← *brewwaną
  • broth ← broþ ← *broþ ← *bruþą
  • fervor ← fervour ← ferveō ← *ferweō ← *ferwejō
  • fervent ← ferventem ← fervēns ← ferveō ← *ferweō
  • ferment ← fermentāre ← fermentum ← ferveō ← *ferweō
  • brim ← brimstone
  • effervescent ← effervescentem ← effervescere ← fervescere ← ferveō
  • porphyry ← porfire ← πορφυρίτης λίθος ← πορφύρα ← πορφύρω

49 more relatives in the full family tree

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Today it means

noun A mark or scar made by burning with a hot iron, especially to mark cattle or to classify the contents of a cask.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “brand”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Proto-Germanic *brinnaną / brand